Fun With Dick and Jane Parent Guide

When Dick and Jane Harper (Jim Carrey and Tea Leoni) unexpectedly lose their jobs, they find they can no longer support their comfortable suburban lifestyle. As their situation becomes more desperate, the couple resorts to a life of robbery and crime to secure an income.

Parent Movie Reviewby Kerry Bennett

Dick Harper (Jim Carrey) and his wife Jane (Tea Leoni) enjoy a comfortable existence in suburbia. He drives a Beamer and works for Globodyne, a media consolidation business. She is a travel agent. Together they have a precocious little boy who is learning Spanish from his nanny (Gloria Garayua).

One morning Dick is summoned to the upper echelons of the office tower and promoted to the position of VP of Communications. In response to his advancement, Jane quits her job and they start some major upgrades around their house. Days later, Dick is given a script and sent on air to announce the quarterly earnings. But just as quick as his meteoric rise takes him to the top of the corporation, the new VP experiences stellar burnout when a scandal is uncovered and the company’s stocks plummet.

Suddenly their American dream vanishes along with their pension and savings.

To stay off their creditors, both look for employment, even applying for minimum wage jobs where mandatory drug tests are part of the application process. However the community is saturated with laid-off Globodyne workers. So when the bank announces its plans to evict them, the couple decides on more desperate means to earn an income. Donning disguises, they follow the lead of Dick’s former boss (Alec Baldwin) who defrauded his staff, and turn to a life of thievery.

Remade from a 1977 movie of the same name, this story makes light of Dick and Jane’s illegal activities and justifies their revengeful attitude. It also negates any consequences for the wrong they commit on other innocent victims. Playing their holdups and home invasions for laughs, the script relies on Carrey’s comedic timing to lessen the seriousness of their crime spree and the resulting violent tussles.

In addition to the robberies, profanities pepper the dialogue including a single voiced and several bleeped uses of a sexual expletive. Sexual innuendo and some discussions of intimate activities between a married couple is also written into the screenplay.

Situational jokes and slapstick humor provide Fun with Dick and Jane with some entertaining moments, especially when Dick finds himself in competition with a roomful of other interviewees, all vying for a single opening. Still, despite the jesting, this desperate duo’s solution to their money woes is no laughing matter.

About author

Kerry Bennett is interested in media from both a journalist and parent perspective. Along with authoring articles for several family-oriented publications, she has written for Parent Previews for over 15 years. As a parent herself, she believes parents play a powerful role in teaching media literacy in their homes.

Fun With Dick and JaneRating & Content Info

Why is Fun With Dick and Jane rated PG-13?Fun With Dick and Jane is rated PG-13 by the MPAA for brief language, some sexual humor and occasional humorous drug references

Desperate times lead to desperate acts at the Harper house. The pressures of job-hunting result in fistfights and some mean spirited efforts to stop other competitors. After a few failed attempts at robbery, the couple successfully pulls off a number of burglaries, a corporate fraud and a vindictive home invasion where they tie up the owner and threaten him. Later, the despair over their situation leads several characters to turn to drinking. Depictions of drunkenness and driving under the influence are shown. While sexual portrayals between the married couple are mild, there are a number of suggestive comments made by various people.

Page last updated April 30, 2009

More parents' guide for Fun With Dick and Jane after the break...

Fun With Dick and Jane Parents' Guide

How do Dick and Jane justify their criminal activities to themselves? How does the script defend their behavior?

What sacrifices are they forced to make following the loss of their careers? How can families or individuals prepare for unexpected job loss?

Home Video

The most recent home video release of Fun With Dick and Jane movie is April 10, 2006. Here are some details…

DVD Release Date: 11 April 2006

If the movie wasn’t enough Fun with Dick and Jane, the DVD release of this Sony Pictures production is all about bringing you laughs. Extras include a gag reel, deleted scenes and the outtakes from a publicity junket where with Jim Carrey and T0xE9a Leoni gave interviews. On a more serious note, director Dean Parisot and screenwriters Judd Apatow and Nicholas Stoller offer an audio commentary. The disc offers the film in both the widescreen and full screen formats, with audio tracks in English (Dolby Digital 5.1) and French (Dolby Digital 5.1), and subtitles in English and French.

Related home video titles:

A young character, based on real life criminal Frank Abagnale, passes himself off as a pilot, doctor and lawyer all before turning 21 in the film Catch Me If You Can. In The Family Man, Tea Leoni plays wife to a corporate scrooge who unexpectedly wakes up to find his life dramatically changed.